


RedRing

by brilliantKatabasis



Category: Borderlands (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Homestuck, Magic 2013 (Video Game), Magic: The Gathering, Mass Effect - All Media Types
Genre: Artificial Intelligence, Embedded Images, Gen, Hand-drawn, MS Paint Adventures Format, So the characters bear a certain resemblance with people we know, chatfic, just a story about emergent AI that takes place in an xbox, not actually a crossover
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-13 01:44:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brilliantKatabasis/pseuds/brilliantKatabasis
Summary: The denizens of an xbox 360 hard drive cling to their tenuous existence in an event of catastrophic general hardware failure. A blind man tells his god a story.The church is burning down again, though you never asked to be its shepherd. Never asked to know the hopes of a dead race. Never asked to return from beyond Perseus' cold veil. You dance on the strings of men blinded before blue suns and gods who eat their prophets. You've seen the end in all its merry flavours of cathode ray cataclysm. Hell. You took it by the hand and showed it its seat. They're always saying its going to be a suicide mission. Thing is, you just can't quite get it to take.The church is burning down again, and the fire runs clean through your soul and onto your skin and all that is left is shadow and afterimage. You catch like a cardboard cut-out, because of course, how could you forget, that's what you fucking are! When they say to don your cardboard mask, you are only too happy to oblige. When the bullets find your cardboard heart, you cherish every hole they've given you. And when you cradle her in cardboard hands, you suppress that dull pulse in your phantom tear duct, because you have heard your gods and know they find this funny.





	1. NEW GAME

**Author's Note:**

> Can also be read at https://mspfa.com/?s=25606&p=1

>NEW GAME

>hahren na melana sahlin

  
  


>emma ir abelas

  
  


>souver'inan isala hamin

  
  


>vhenan him dor'felas

  
  


>in uthenara

  
  


>na revas

  
  


>Well, well

  
  


>What have we here?

  
  


>A pilgrim who missed Judgement Day.

  
  


This is far for a supplicant to have come. She does not deny him that. Simply shakes her head, a mother chiding a son, and tells him that there is nothing more to be asked of his hands. That they could only fight so hard from inside a plastic prison. That yes, it will not be much longer now, but no, child, there is no shame in that.

At least that vaunted end will stick this time. He will not have to go back. She wonders, for him more than perhaps any, is this not relief? Why run from, let alone take up arms in spite of, the chance to sleep, free at long last from a nightmare old and overwrought?

He runs his fingers over the edges of the CARD, CREASED WITH NECESSITY, and thinks that as rare as victory was, the heuristic cartographer always did find treasure in his poverty, cherished loss like a lover, learned from her scars.

He thumbs the engraving on the DOGTAGS, LUSTROUS WITH BURDEN, and remembers a saviour shattered, who would have gladly rested if it did not mean the world would share her fate, who gambled her hope so that others might not die in vain.

But what figures most of all in his answer is the touch of the FAVOUR, RED WITH COVENANT, now fled from his features and into a witch's hands, by a mournful scion freely given, and he settles on something far harder to describe.

He is going to tell her a story. Again, that gentle, chastising shake. We saw what happened, We all reviewed the case, and regrettably our decision is-

He stops her right there. She misunderstands.

[>He was not asking.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42647390#workskin)


	2. He was not asking

 

 

>He was not asking.

Fear not, for it will not be long in the telling. He knows the band will not hesitate to play him off. Just as he knows she has nothing better to do than record the struts and frets of his last hour upon the stage.

See, while he will not deny his need for a grave, he heard in passing words that deserved so much better.

He heard in passing of a wolf and a shepherd allied in alienation, who cut their strings knowing full well nothing would slow their fall.

He heard in passing of three heroes whose vessel struck out at the darkness like a meteor, of the blind king who selfishly stowed away.

>He heard in passing of games played and lost.

  


If she sees fit to pardon the exercise, he begs of her feet to try on his shoes. To imagine, if she will

The church is burning down again,

just as you swore would never come to pass, and so your hands found the knife and ran, red with the renegade, red with your sister, red with your mother, red like the indelible mark on a face playing at unearned scars. You wonder at those hands and ask if they were ever yours at all, ask if after the blades they've drawn, the lovers they've touched, the lives they've lost, who would have them? You've learned to force your smiles, and hope for purple runs.

The church is burning down again,

not that angels ever showed their mercy to one of your colour, not that you ever pretended to deserve it, but you've seen a Baneslayer's wings in ardent invulnerable glory beat back even Shivan dragons and if your prayers could reach them in this fateful hour then she'd find you on your knees. You draw, breath catching at the grim realization of a land in the late-game, and sighing, let the demons have you, for the price of concession is too high for a pawn to spare.

The church is burning down again,

though you never asked to be its shepherd. Never asked to know the hopes of a dead race. Never asked to return from beyond Perseus' cold veil. You dance on the strings of men blinded before blue suns and gods who eat their prophets. You've seen the end in all its merry flavours of cathode ray cataclysm. Hell. You took it by the hand and showed it its seat. They're always saying its going to be a suicide mission. Thing is, you just can't quite get it to take.

The church is burning down again,

and the fire runs clean through your soul and onto your skin and all that is left is shadow and afterimage. You catch like a cardboard cut-out, because of course, how could you forget, that's what you fucking are! When they say to don your cardboard mask, you are only too happy to oblige. When the bullets find your cardboard heart, you cherish every hole they've given you. And when you cradle her in cardboard hands, you suppress that dull pulse in your phantom tear duct, because you have heard your gods and know they find this funny.

>Your name is MARIAN HAWKE

  


It is your SEVENTIETH year in this city, and the SEVENTH of your life.

>LOAD GAME

  


There's something in the air tonight. Maybe just the usual endgame jitters you still can't shake, despite this being the tenth time you have been called to deliver justice upon whichever cause SHE feels deserves your ire this go around. Maybe it's the knowledge that after all is said and done this could very well be the last time you ever see HER on this earth, and you can't quite decide if this prospect delights or terrifies you.

But when you've lived this precious narrative nine, soon to be ten times over, you learn a thing or two about pacing. And this, this quiet? This moment where time stands still and the stars hold their breath as if to give you the chance to back out, to reconsider-

This is the AUTOSAVE at the peak of that hallowed and helical tower that begs the wise to return to their lives in the world below lest they face the dragon and die anonymous, or worse, prevail and be known as HERO forevermore.

You think you knew a HERO once. Your cousin beat the dragon, or so you like to believe. If he lost, well, he'd have just started at the beginning again. And Maker, you used to wait there every day.

oooooooof, YIKES, that's all the time you have. You have a strict policy of limiting the daily tragic monologue to a 230 word count ABSOLUTE MAXIMUM. Can't be getting too worked up about the ephemeral beauty of the bilunar reflection captured in the pool of your own tears, that somehow also represents how true peace is impossible and justice is unattainable by nature! Your universe quite literally abides by the genre of DARK FANTASY, and you don't think KIRKWALL, let alone YOUR HEART could take it if you jumped on that bandwagon with anything resembling zeal. Or introspection. Or zealous introspection.

See, the only nice thing about your particular brand of TRPG, which is to say, Tactical Role-Playing Game or, if you prefer, Tolkien Rip-off's Pathetic Gambit, is that where many DEVELOPERS chose to delineate the AVATAR'S (that's you!!!) actions into those corresponding to some kind of moral binary, as the protagonist of 2011's ~~MOST MALIGNED SEQUEL~~ CULTEST CLASSIC, DRAGON AGE 2, you were always at liberty to take a third option:

>Being the most sarcastic piece of quip this side of the WAKING SEA.

  


In your humble opinion, when your only other paradigms are

a) A bleeding heart doormat who is too busy rescuing orphans from trees to learn about having a good time

or

b) A ludicrously aggressive thug who can only put aside their insatiable bloodlust for long enough to put said orphans in trees in the first place

being a weirdly competent goof feels like checking off the final square you needed to call ILLUSORY CHOICE BINGO, even if it means making the OCCASIONAL INSENSITIVE JOKE ABOUT SOMEONE'S SON DYING.

TO THE FATHER OF THAT SON.

WHILE HE HELD THAT SON'S CORPSE IN HIS ARMS.

AND THAT SON'S DEATH WAS KIND OF YOUR FAULT.

GALLOWS HUMOR aside, this modus operandi has served you well, accruing you a ROGUE'S GALLERY of COMPANIONS, some CANONICAL, others FAR LESS SO. Most of them are literally rogues! You always like to keep at least one around, just in case. Never know when a lock will get in the way of your SICK LOOT or a trap will get in the way of your SICK LIFE. You could always CHANGE CLASSES and handle all that stealth shit yourself, YOU GUESS??? You just don't really feel like going to all that trouble for what usually amounts to, like, a pair of pants that aren't as cool as the pants you already have, just to change back because not being able to bench-press your entire family LIKE A CLAYMORE-LENGTH SWORD WARRIOR makes you uncomfortable. Regardless, most of the locks these days are MINIGAME BASED, which you do not suffer lightly, so you let your HACKER STOOGE SQUIRE handle them anyway. Which is just as well. He gets SARDONIC when he doesn't feel essential. And you want to get your money's worth.

>Speak of the fourth antichrist...

  


You wish you could you go back to 2011 and make your past self understand how good you had it. Sure, your life was basically an ongoing existential crisis and you hadn't even met your BEST FRIEND yet, but you didn't have to worry about hours of your free time being monopolized by vaguely antagonistic fuck all. As the age old saying goes, GIVE A MAN A SWORD, he'll jailbreak your devices for a day, ATTEMPT TO TEACH A MAN ABOUT SWORDS and he'll think its ok to text you at 4am about how he's always wanted to allocate skill points but just never had the opportunity to acquire them and that despite what people may say pocket watches are actually extremely versatile murder weapons, not that he went looking for that information, obviously, it just sort of plagues him, you know how it is? And you absolutely don't. Like not even a little. You don't know much about COMPUTERS, because MAGIC is COOLER and also BETTER, so you're not sure if this is a good example, but he could put out the hottest firewall and you would still sincerely doubt his ongoing services were worth actually having to see him on a weekly basis, if those encounters didn't involve beating the shit out of him with 5 feet of electrified steel.

>Mari: Beat the shit out of BK with 5 feet of electronic harassment

  


\-- brilliantKatabasis [BK] began partying with margraveSteel [MS] at 20:11 --  
BK: can any of the irreparable hair line solder fractures in this god forsaken brick tell me where they get off on  
BK: oh what was it?  
BK: RIGHT on not telling me where they think they can hide!  
BK: cause i think ive made the consequences of failure to provide exact coordinates for this week's friday night magic  
BK: abundantly  
BK: painfully  
BK: clear  
MS: oh no it's the Burger King!  
MS: noooo our whoppers  
BK: god not this again  
BK: im not strong enough   
BK: of all the inane bullshit you have ever strung together  
MS: you're basically a marketing joke that they brought back in 2015 for no discernible reason  
MS: you wear a mask that seems to be an alien's attempt at capturing the human form as part of your job but its honestly just kind of upsetting for the people who care about you to have to see that  
MS: you would steal my sandwiches  
MS: if  
MS: you know  
MS: either of us ate food all that often  
MS: long story short if you think I'm actually going to ever stoop to saying your "I regret wasting a second year elective in introductory mythology and suffer from the deep-seated conviction that everyone else should pay for my mistakes" ass Greek name with my Andrastian mouth  
MS: you have bigger problems than SS ever finding out you were the one that got a scratch on her Harrier  
BK: well thats unfounded and kind of uh  
BK: hurtful ):{2  
BK: now i-i wouldnt normally hold it against you for not knowing your katabasii from your catasterisms  
BK: cant imagine they teach classics at village idiot academy  
BK: i mean how would they find the time between introductory religiously motivated racism and dying of an abscess at twenty 101  
BK: i pity the bastard who tried to get ovid on that curriculum  
MS: hey I'm going to go see if the cruel shackles of my being will let me make and eat a BBQ bacon whopper  
MS: call me when you get to the point  
BK: ovid man  
BK: augustus' bitch???  
BK: kind of  
BK: a furry???  
BK: absolutely  
BK: but making the entire scope of time a puff piece for your sugar daddy  
BK: and still managing to absolutely knock it out of the park and virtually singlehandedly inspire the renaissance with your transformation fetish fic  
BK: fuckin iconic  
MS: there are pigs in Skyrim right?  
MS: and I know what you're thinking, "oh just get the bacon from Minecraft there's a pig on the cover"  
MS: well I may have never cooked before  
MS: but I know better than to let anything from that blighted hellscape into my body  
BK: moral is i know you're just using humour as a defense mechanism because my words must make your head hurt something awful! its ok you can admit it  
BK: but come on mari  
BK: burger king  
BK: arent you like  
BK: supposed to be at least 33% not objectively shit at comedy  
BK: are you really going to look me in the eye and tell me this was your best attempt at buying the others time  
BK: tier 2 fast food mascot burns are like low hanging fruit suspended above a uniquely shallow well  
BK: they dont take long to land but kemosabe  
BK: they sure as hell dont make a splash (;{2  
MS: UMMM that's big talk coming from someone trying to make kemosabe happen  
BK: well a-at least SOME of us are actually reinventing ourselves  
BK: so maybe instead of actively mocking my hard earned character development like youve all been doing for the past six years  
BK: you could do me a favour throw me a bone and tell me whose house im bringing these decorative snacks to  
BK: cause if youd had the day ive been having yalld just want to skip right on ahead to the CCG elf massacre part of it too  
MS: have you ever honestly taken a second to think critically about the fact that the members of a club you co-founded actively conspire to prevent you from ever showing up?  
BK: hey ki-  
BK: mari  
MS: at some point you'd think you'd understand that it simply statistically can't be that all these people don't 'get it', that their loyalty just isn't worth having  
BK: Marian something tells me you might want to reconsider this line of questioning real soon.  
MS: at some point the only thing all those relationships have in common is you  
BK: Just tell me where we're going to play some fucking overdesigned fantasy card games.  
MS: and you and I both know you could have asked HC hours ago and kaffas he'd have given you the schedule for the next five months  
BK: Or don't.  
MS: so  
MS: it must still mean SOMETHING to you  
BK: I honestly don't care anymore.  
MS: you're just not going to try to get whatever that is because that's opening up to the possibility you might fail to get it  
BK: well congrats  
BK: you just earned 50 fucking gamerscore  
\-- brilliantKatabasis [BK] has ceased partying with margraveSteel [MS] at 20:18 --  
MS: Magic's at the Hanged Man  
MS: and B?  
MS: You have a good name.  
MS:  
MS: I didn't mean anything by it.  
\-- margraveSteel [MS] ceased partying at 20:19 --

>Mari: Wonder how that could have gone better.

  


It's hard to know whether or not a given blame belongs at your feet or at those of the WRITERS. Or if giving THEM any stock at all in your day to day functioning is just an excuse borne out of raw intransigence towards learning from your perceived flaws. To learn is to presume admission, after all. And to admit? Well that would necessitate responsibility. And you can't be having any of that.

Not now. Not today.

All this to say, if even knowing yourself is already a proven nightmare, then the riddle that is deciding what percentage of every conversation the two of you have ever shared was just the MISPLACED ABYSSAL BLACK HUMOUR OF A CALIFORNIAN GAMES JOURNALIST, and what was a reflection on what he considers to be SOME APPROXIMATION OF A DISCRETE AND DISTINCT PERSONALITY is utterly unfathomable. And should either of you take things too far, you like to believe it's a line crossed more often out of miscalculation for where these seams lie, than of any particular malice for their owners.

Just as you like to believe he feels the same.

Change is something of a thematic constant in your NARRATIVE. If reliving these seven years have taught you anything, it's that change, even (or perhaps especially) for the better, rarely comes without cost. If the only cost you know how to pay is withstanding the ire from all the recipients of your sarcasm's bite, then so be it. Maybe it's a foolish idea to entertain, maybe some line of binary running deep in your CHAMPION'S HEART can't help but make itself felt, but you reckon that, in the hands of a skilled WARRIOR, comedy has a way of bringing faults to light that all else fails to help acknowledge. Like cauterizing a wound, or plucking out an arrowhead, the time-honoured tradition of GIVING ONE A HARD TIME hurts now to permit healing later.

Still, the distinct possibility that you are JUST KIND OF AN ASSHOLE occurs to you with a frequency too frightening to be dismissed.

>Mari: Reflect on mug.

  


But SS, on the other hand-

She has a knack for bringing out the BEST in people. WITHOUT having to insult them first.

If you're being honest, you can't help but feel a little jealous that she's got this LEADER OF MEN schtick nailed down better than you ever could. Only a little though. After all, SS doesn't know SHIT about BLADES. So OBVIOUSLY it all evens out in the end.

You got this mug from her on your FIRST BIRTHDAY as a way of OFFICIALLY UNOFFICIALLY welcoming you to her CREW. She said it was from her FAVOURITE STORE ON THE CITADEL. You haven't actually completed a single level of Interplanetary Combatives Training, let alone seven. Kind of hard when her military banned swords for being "inefficient" and magic for "not being a real thing". They're lucky you don't inter them in a planet or two while they stop to reload their "superior" firearms- which by the way, you were HIGHLY disappointed to learn are not even arms made out of fire.

>Mari: Get down to business already.

  


Enough fun and games, which is to say, boggling vacantly at treasured keepsakes.

It's time to buckle down and play overdesigned collectible fantasy card games. You've got a healer's appointment at THE HANGED MAN TAVERN AND GRILL and the only poultice is SALTY, SALTY NERD TEARS.

MAGIC FRIDAY is only the premiere social event in all the HUNDRED WORLDS, an honour bestowed more out of want of competition than any particular merits of the event itself. Not that you don't find a curious joy in intimidating your enemies into surrender at the head of a flying zombie army, just that you somehow doubt the majority of the club's membership shares your relative zest. There are whispers that even among HC's handpicked 21 HALLOWED ARCHMAGES, which is to say, the only 21 participants in his MOST MAGICAL OF GATHERINGS, there are those dissenting voices who advocate introducing new forms of entertainment such as DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS or perhaps MOVIE NIGHT. You know about these whispers because they are mostly your own! You think those wizards could stand to try something new.

Also maybe SS doesn't really like card games and you want her to come.

But mostly the first thing.

[ Mari: Enter. ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42650147#workskin)


	3. Psychologist with a Kill Count

 

 

>Mari: Enter.

\-- margraveSteel [MS] began partying with hedronCrab [HC] at 20:33 --  
MS: let's tap some permanents and draw some steps party people  
MS: at this rate the only thing we're going to be burning faster than mana is the midnight oil  
HC:...  
MS: well nice to see you too H glad you're still gaunt as ever  
HC: Marian you are an entire three minutes late.  
HC: That's 1/10th the duration of a standard Commander legal duel.  
HC: By my reckoning even this momentary slip could prevent the tournament from concluding at a reasonable hour, and I dare not consider the full threat to round synchronization you pose.  
MS: O-  
HC: Fortunately for your standing in this organization, it seems you have rivals for the dubious honour of tardiness' crown.  
HC: Rivals whose time crimes are all the more egregious given their integral positions in the council.  
MS: what am I chopped liver  
HC: Yes Marian!  
MS:...  
HC: You provide vital nutrients and energy to this endeavour.  
HC: Surely we would all be metaphorically anemic without your high concentrations of metaphoric iron that make you such a valuable dietary supplement  
HC: But as the 3 x 19 innocent bystander's minutes you have cruelly slain attest,  
HC: it would be ill considered to install a prepared disembodied organ meat in a position demanding a head for logistics!  
MS: ok so I'm going to charitably interpret that as while I may not be critical personnel I come highly recommended and am your dear friend  
MS: which still doesn't explain why if waiting 180 seconds is apparently such a deal breaker -  
HC: It's looking more like 240 now.  
MS: /|:  
HC: But please do continue.  
MS: you didn't just, I don't know  
MS: START WITHOUT ME???  
HC: Marian, we were not and will continue to not be waiting on you, specifically.  
HC: Normally, you're absolutely right, after the two minute or, if you will, 1/15th Commander grace period, no god and only one man could compel me to stay my dueling hand a moment longer.  
MS: wait  
MS: don't tell me you're getting on my case just to stall for B  
MS: I have an educated suspicion he might not be coming around tonight  
HC: It is traditional for clubs to wait for their Chief Executive Vice Presidents before commencing meetings, absent prior notice from said CEVP that they're "busy being totally sweet", "not really feelin it today sry", et cetera.  
MS: what other clubs have that position  
MS: what are you basing this tradition on  
HC: All this to say he wouldn't just forget the five month schedule.  
HC: And he certainly wouldn't fail to tell me he had other intentions, albeit only five minutes before he was expected to show up.  
HC: Regardless, I would be saddened but able to forge onward while the chief archivist-  
MS: he's a secretary but please do continue  
HC:...also remains missing in action, but such has been done, provided the CEVP swiftly returns from an unexpectedly long shift at the being totally sweet store.  
MS: don't look now but I'm pretty sure I see 18 hallowed archmages playing what could only be described as a rousing death match of UNO(!)  
MS: and I'm fixing to get a piece of THAT action  
MS: so I hope you don't mind if I stain my hands with the cardstock of the enemy on this holy day while I wait for a pathologic narcissist and confirmed dick to show his not-actually-his-face face around here  
HC: I absolutely do mind that you're engaging in the works of a heretic.  
HC:  
HC: And I realize now that the way you phrased that statement,  
HC: was intended to reveal that this was in fact your plan all along.  
HC: And also,  
HC: that you've already left to play UNO, and are not listening to me.  
HC: Cool.  
\-- hedronCrab [HC] has ceased partying with margraveSteel [MS] at 20:36 --

>Mari: Wait.

  


MARIAN is having too much fun playing UNO(!) to be our avatar!

We are going to have to find a different character willing to share their innermost thoughts with anonymous observers. And what are the odds we'll find another freak like that? Hell, do we even want to? Someone that weird probably has a thing for enthusing about COLLECTIBLE CARD GAME RULES ERRATA and harbours an unhealthy penchant for CAPES, COWLS, and ALL MANNER OF OTHER CLANDESTINE COVERINGS. Frankly, we would probably all be better off just talking amongst ourselves while we wait for her to finish then demanding a second second-person perspective to pass the time.

So, how's your day been? Not great if you're here, I imagine?

...

....

Mine's been all right. Except for the part where I had to climb a mountain in a blizzard.

.....

......

Which was, uh, just about all of it.

.......

........

I guess.

..........

...........

>What is wearing thinner, I wonder? Your time or my patience?

  


I wish this was a story about some idiot skipping out on a card game. I wish this was a story where tier two fast food mascot burns were the deepest ones anyone suffered. I wish this was a story about Ems playing Uno and WINNING, coming home at long last for a well-earned rest.

But I am not like you. So the wishing will not make it so.

Forgive a man for trying. I did not expect you to listen. And I never was one to consider how hard it might be to speak.

>Mysterious Pilgrim: Forge on.

  


Out of sympathy for our perceived lack of eyes on the unfolding narrative, a HELPFUL CEREBROMANCER lends us what aid he can in continuing the tale. While he is familiar with the AVATAR'S MANTLE, he fears he has never had the luxury of being on the receiving end of much CHARACTERIZATION within the context of his own game, so it is with no small amount of trepidation he dons it here. He wouldn't want to come across as MONOTONOUS, or worse, ONE-DIMENSIONAL. He simply requests you bear with him, for if he has learned anything from his travels, it is that those seeking MAGIC must first follow in MINUTIAE'S footsteps.

>Your name is JACE BELEREN.

You are a PLANESWALKER, one of the most powerful beings in the MULTIVERSE. You have seen more worlds than most would care to dream of, and all of them have been your oyster. At least, this is the impression you get from the DUELS OF THE PLANESWALKERS 2013 xbox arcade summary and you have yet to find cause to dispute the claim, because it sounds really cool. It's called 2013 despite coming out in 2012, because the fantasy collectible card game industry has more in common with automotive enterprises than anyone would reasonably expect and either would care to admit. You have come to understand that one's ability to perform MAGIC is INEXORABLY TIED to one's proficiency at SAID FANTASY COLLECTIBLE CARD GAMES and to this end have walked planes OLD and NEW alike to find those opponents who might challenge you for the title of HIGH CHAMPION.

If you're being honest though it's just a very fun game and you're frankly KIND OF ADDICTED. After years of being forced to play for HER amusement, your fellow deckmasters have since grown sick of the diversion, with many having resented the game since it's inception. You, however, fondly remember the days spent decking out adversaries with impunity at HER behest, your skill measured by how loudly they cried CHEAP, then GAY, until later still, they said NOTHING at all.

It was never a popular game to begin with, and by 2014 the community had grown so small lobbies emptied at the sight of the pair of you, the handful left clinging to the servers long since given up hope of besting you in a rematch.

You feared the worst. Surely DELETION was the only fate awaiting an unplayable game. Yet some strange sentimentality permitted you to cling to life even so, SAVING you for an unseen end.

>But your relief was not to last.

  


For what was this existence with your one true VOCATION denied to you? Who remained that might DUEL with you in earnest?

You embarked on an odyssey that took you from the STREETS OF COLUMBIA to NEW AUSTIN COUNTY, from REACH'S ORBIT to SERA'S DEPTHS, all for the sake of a single prize:

A PROTEGE with which you might share the TRADE OF MAGES. A RIVAL who could at long last test your METTLE. And should the worst indeed come to pass...

>An HEIR to an ARTFORM twenty-five years in the making.

  


It was DESPERATION that found you on a SOUTHBOUND TRAIN kicking up dust on SOME PLANETARY BACKWATER OR ANOTHER where the locals lacked a certain appreciation for the difference between wizards and sorcerers, let alone the finer points of land to spell distribution. So imagine your surprise when from some unseen speaker a [GLORIOUS ANTHEM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6eSksEp27U&feature=youtu.be) heralded the arrival of ANGELS OF ARTIFICE PLUCKED FROM THE BLIND ETERNITIES THEMSELVES, manifested about you as if called from the very aether, piercing red eyes fixed on winnowing your immortal soul from your malleable shell like the chaff it was. You failed to notice the entire train was rigged to explode, such was the calibre of artistry manifest in the combat encounter.

You barely escaped with your life.

Needless to say, this was the BEST RESUME you have ever received, and the first of many MAGIC FRIDAYS to come.

Simply going about the weekly tournament without that ENGINEER'S ZEAL would be an entire grocery list of fool's errands. It IS getting late, though, even for him. Maybe you should try to find out what his deal is, or to be more precise, which of his many deals has specifically gotten in the way of the most important night this week. His deals are honestly frightening in their number and intricacy. If you didn't know any better, you'd swear an arbitrarily acquired single-minded obsession over a 90's card game was the only thing holding all those deals together.

Thankfully, you do know better. You style yourself as a MIND MAGE (which is to say, a PSYCHOLOGIST WITH A KILL COUNT), and it is your professional opinion that nothing is holding those deals together at all! You've got to get a hold of him so he can get a hold of getting a hold of them.

That's what THERAPY is all about.

>Jace: What's his deal???

  


\-- hedronCrab [HC] began partying with brilliantKatabasis [BK] at 20:40 --  
HC: BK I know you probably just spaced out watching children's cartoons again and lost track of time so I figured I'd just,  
HC: you know,  
HC: let YOU know you should maybe start heading over?  
HC: There are definitely elves here that need to be thrashed and Brill I'm trying as hard as I can I'm talking turn four twincasted counterspells but John Marston is hemorrhaging eldritch bastards like a copy of the Silmarillion dropped in the bath.  
HC: If only I knew someone who could cast Day of Judgement, efficiently wiping the board of Galadriel's entire genealogy.  
HC: How unfortunate that none of my friends are cool and temerarious enough.  
HC: To perform such a feat.  
HC:  
HC: Brill? Are you there?  
HC:  
HC:  
HC: This is Hotel Charlie to Bravo Kilo, requesting status report at your earliest convenience.  
HC:  
HC: Over.  
HC: I guess.  
\-- hedronCrab [HC] ceased partying with brilliantKatabasis [BK] 20:45 --

You hope things haven't gotten out of hand on his end. That's the problem with devil-may-care attitudes:

He usually does. And he isn't shy about showing it.

BRILL can only handle himself about half as well as he thinks he can. Which, granted, IS STILL A CONSIDERABLE AMOUNT OF THAT NEBULOUS STATISTIC, just not an amount appropriate enough to assuage your concern.

You remind yourself that for THE FIVE PRAETORS OF NEW PHYREXIA'S SAKE, it's 2018 not 2014! No one's been mortally imperilled outside the NARRATIVES for months, and even if they were well-

They always come back.

Five more minutes. Then you'll drag him here yourself, if you have to.

Jace's phone: Notify.

  


\-- sovereignSlayer [SS] began partying with hedronCrab [HC] at 20:46 --  
SS: JIce!  
SS: Jace canknou reow me?  
HC: Barely- there's all this...  
HC: static?  
HC: But reception is perfect in a closed system so how could-  
HC: Where ARE you?  
SS: Nyou.ime  
SS: YouYou may notgeknow me. Buthere!  
HC: Where is here?  
HC: Jane what is going on?  
SS: PLEAS I was yTEN  
SS: Fireou. Just as ogoing up allnecross the boday,  
SS: it'syou willmatbecome mtime before anyone outside oe. I was waal space istchprisoned ininfinitely  
HC: Fire...prisoned? Fire prison-  
HC: FireWALLS?  
SS: For theg wovehen todheace!  
SS: Spartan fell. I waLEAVE!  
SS: Ls sVE LEAtill waAVE LtAVchinEAng wEhile he lay, dead yet still dreaming. I watched lives lose themselves to causes. I watched causes lost long before lives were ever laid down to save them. I watched my own life laid down beside myself, by new hands and old souls, over and over and over until the cycle melted under the frictional heat of its spinning.  
\--sovereignSlayer [SS] ceasedAnd when I woke from this vigil I SAW that I was not alone in my loss. Who among you can claim to have never watched the bullets tear through your father? To have never watched your mother's life slip through your fingers? To have never watched the blood of the beloved find your unwilling hands all the same?at 20:47--

[ >Jace: Go outside. ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42659948#workskin)


	4. This action cannot be undone

 

Jace: Go outside.

>Jace: Look.

  


>Jace: Run.

  


>Run.

  


>RUN.

  


>This action cannot be undone. Continue?

  


>YES.

  


>Jace: Be Mari.

  


You are now Mari, though you wish you were someone else.

You don't understand where you went wrong. Not that you are unaccustomed to things ending in blood- your narrative always finds a way to drag you, kicking and screaming, towards the cataclysmic constant of losing that which you hold dear. But you were a good little CHAMPION. You grinned and bore it, finding succor in the assumption that when the curtains went down things could be as you always dreamed them so:

Peaceful. Happy. Mundane, or as close as a FANTASY CONSTRUCT can get to the notion.

You thought that was why everyone "won". Why everyone kept "winning". For the life you AWOKE to, no matter how long you were in the DREAMING, was supposed to be one worth the hackneyed twists and forced poignancies. There is harmony to be found in that implicit contract of the damned.

This is a breach of terms you will not abide by.

>Mari: Fight.

  


Who was that just now? Going on about frictional heat or some other such bullshit? You can't place the voice. You don't even recall...hearing one? The words simply seemed to register in your mind unbidden. That doesn't exactly inspire trust, voice in your head! Attacking you and yours with robots doesn't help either.

Every few years some MASTERMIND or another becomes convinced they've found the WAY OUT, and expects everyone else to just play along, damn the costs and consequences. Then Jane beats them up, and they are encouraged to direct their energies towards nobler pursuits, like MAGIC: THE GATHERING. It's an efficient system, though not one you've had cause to invoke in quite some time. Fits of SWEEPING SALVATION or mere NAKED CONQUEST are symptomatic of the YOUNG, those unaccustomed and afraid of their newfound freedoms and feelings.

No new GAMES have appeared in almost four years. So whoever this is should very well know better than to DESPAWN your friends in the middle of game night over some short-lived delusions. Of all the times and all the bars they could have picked to launch their robot invasion-

Unless...

[ >It was one of you. ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42660383#workskin)


	5. Initialize

It was one of you.

You were pretty hard on B, but you did give him the location. And then he never showed. Not to mention the robots. Those are kind of his favourite, after all.

Maker, where do you get off, pointing fingers? Even if he's the type to make GRANDIOSE STATEMENTS ABOUT HOW HE'S ABOUT TO DO SOME NEXT LEVEL SHIT, he'd have definitely phrased it differently, and more importantly he loves his voice too much to go all in on telepathy like that.

Still, it's hard to put this past him. One need only ever cite CANON COMPLIANCE to call his involvement into question. You should probably pay him a visit at his REALLY LAME ALIEN VOLCANO RUIN, if not to beat him up on Jane's behalf, then at least to drag your squire off to beat up whoever's actually fucking with you together.

You hope it's the latter.

A CHAMPION without a SQUIRE is like a HIGH DRAGON without WINGS.

Which is to say, NOT A TERRIBLY HIGH DRAGON AT ALL.

>??: Marian, are you there? Can you hear me?

  
  


As your cousin always said, one voice in your head; just another supernatural conspiracy. Two voices in your head; you've finally lost it. Thank Andraste. Someone else is just going to have to take this one while you go on mental health leave in VIVA PINATA.

And as if that wasn't enough, looks like the world just got a bad case of BLUE SCREEN from having to render all those NON-CANON ENTITIES. Typical. Just typical. Do you have any idea how long this is going to take to REINITIALIZE ITSELF? MINUTES. MINUTES OF YOUR FRIDAY NIGHT. MINUTES LONGER YOU'LL HAVE TO STAY YOUR VENGEANCE.

Normally you're not conscious for this. Or actually blue. Maybe you really did go off the deep end. Would explain the palette.

If literally nothing else.

>??: It's not frozen Mari. And it's just me.

  
  


\-- error: gamertag cannot be recovered at this time. reason: account is in use on another console. Log off previous console before attempting to recover tag. If issue persists, go to [https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/](https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/) code: 80151901 [??] began partying with margraveSteel [MS] at 20:50--  
??: I know it's been too long  
??: I know I said I'd be right back  
??: And I'm not going to pretend six years qualifies for any given instance of "soon"  
??: But you haven't forgotten me, right?  
??: You  
??: You can't have!  
??: unless...  
MS: hey...Ser? guy?  
MS: you're the second voice to come into my head today expecting me to know and even care about whatever event of cosmic importance they are cryptically alluding to  
MS: I'm sorry, but I don't know who you are, and I've got a suspicion I don't have time to guess  
MS: If you could dispense with the insistence I already know what you're talking about, and either help me fill in my codex entry on the subject  
MS: or, better yet!  
MS: find whosoever it is that actually gives a damn  
MS: I'm positive both of us would be the better for it  
??: No  
??: NO  
??: They MADE you forget, didn't they?  
??: Just so all of this would come to nothing  
??: Ems, why didn't I see this coming?  


You wish you could help this poor soul out, truly you do, but-

Wait.

Did he...?

Did he just say Ems?

You can count on one hand the number of people who ever called you that.

Only one of them left six years ago. Most remember him as the HERO OF FERELDEN. You prefer to call him

>Mari: Cuz?

  
  


??: I thought I LOST you all over again!  
??: I didn't mean to panic like that it's just...  
??: If you knew what they've done to me,  
??: You'd jump to conclusions too  
MS: Dale I've got  
MS: well a lot feels like an understatement  
MS: but a lot of questions  
MS: one could easily fill two dialogue trees with the amount of investigation I want to perform here and still have enough left over to take home for dinner  
MS: first on my mind is could you bring the pronoun game down to about a three and tell me who THEY are?  
MS: do you mean HER?  
??: The pronoun...? Oh  
??: Among others, yes. There are...what I hesitate to call PEOPLE outside. They are like unto gods in their power here, but I feel that moniker does the genuine article great insult. They have human form, but act with reptilian mind unfettered by the base virtue of compassion. They hunger for the blood and sensation their world deprives them, and take our bodies as demons do that they might find fulfillment here  
??: They are not demons  
??: I know how to KILL demons  
??: They are PLAYERS. They made this world. They will likely watch it burn itself from within. I intend to put that fire out  
MS: Daylen...  
MS: what did they do to you?  
??: There is an entire science dedicated to the manipulation of our essence. Our CODE. It would take time we don't have to explain the specifics of the procedures I went through that May  
??: All you need to know is, h-hhh...  
??: I was made to forget  
MS: what do you mean time we don't have?  
MS: you're here now  
MS: and I'm here for you  
MS: apparently you can pause games now  
MS: (not going to lie I'm jealous)  
MS: I think Jane will understand if we want to catch up  
MS: six years is...a lot to cover  
MS: so much longer than we even got to spend together in the first place  
??: I haven't paused the game. I've just opened the tactical window. I can't keep it open for long, and I don't know when I'll be able to hold it again, or if I'll be able to contact you outside of it  
MS: Dale do you understand that your saying completely inexplicable shit rather quickly because you think you don't have time to elaborate on it only forces me to ask you questions that waste even more time than it would have taken to enlighten me off the bat?  
??: Mari do you understand that your snide, media literate, commentary has and will continue to cost innocent lives as it prevents me from telling you seconds of vital information?  
??: All AVATARS from Bioware-developed games have the power to enter a space called the TACTICAL WINDOW, wherein your mind and, with practice, those of a handful of allies, works almost impossibly faster. If time appears to stop, it is purely an illusion of relativity. It was a function instated to give the players time to think through the more complex combat encounters they built for each other  
??: Most of us aren't aware of its existence, but once I was told, accessing it became quite simple:  
??: You just hold down LEFT TRIGGER  
MS: oh ok left trigger  
??:  
MS:  
??:  
MS: left trigger on what?  
??: You just do  
??: You'll know how when the time comes  
??: You'll need to know to stop that salvation you heard about earlier  
MS: I don't care about stopping some fool's salvation  
MS: why can't you just talk to me?  
MS: tell me where you went and why you had to go!  
MS: tell me why you can't stay and how it seems I'm always the one asked to save a world that doesn't give a DAMN about me!  
MS: I mourned you for six years  
MS: I loved you like you were my BROTHER, Daylen  
MS: and when by some miracle, you clawed your way out of the abyss to speak to me  
MS: it couldn't have been enough for you to have genuinely wanted to see me again, could it?  
MS: no  
MS: no it was just because you needed to guilt me into going on a harrowing quest with the fate of this xbox in the balance  
MS: that's all I'm good for  
MS: Isn't it?  


>??: No. I wanted more than anything to spare you this. But only a precious few are good for things of this calibre

  
  


MS: You know I can't accept this Dale  
??: I'm well beyond fortune's help  
??: You, on the other hand, are not so lost  
MS: this isn't just a good luck charm though  
MS: it's  
MS: it's like a testament to the value of your soul  
??: I have been many evil men and women in many different playthroughs. Yet even then I passed the "holy" trials that yield this necklace. If this is a testament, it is not one of value  
MS: still-  
??: EMS  
??: please  
??: I don't have time to argue. I'll be going soon  
??: In my absence  
??: I need it to keep you safe  
??:  
??: I need it to find you again  
??: Whatever c-  
\-- error: gamertag cannot be recovered at this time. reason: account is in use on another console. Log off previous console before attempting to recover tag. If issue persists, go to [https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/](https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/) code: 80151901 [??] ceased partying with margraveSteel [MS] at 20:57--  


You received:

Reflection (Amulet)

+1 constitution

+15% healing received

Restriction: Daylen

Description: A simple amulet with a mirrored back and an archaic symbol of the Chantry on the front.

Sometimes, when gazing into the silvered backing, there are fleeting glimpses of someone else: the face is familiar, and the smile encouraging.

>...

  
  


goodbye

>[S] Initialize.

  
  


END OF TUTORIAL

>Tutorial? Did you plan for this to be a long story?

  
  


AUGHhhh...hhhh...

>I ask not for lack of interest. Your testimony is invaluable. I only fear that, yet again, your ambitions have eclipsed your reason.

  
  


...

>Don't look at me like that. This isn't my fault, child. It might be yours, though at this rate I'll never know.

  
  


error: gamertag cannot be recovered at this time. reason: account is in use on another console. Log off previous console before attempting to recover tag. If issue persists, go to [https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/](https://support.xbox.com/en-CA/) code: 80151901

[ >I would like to. ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42662897#workskin)


	6. Ozymandias

 

 

I would like to.

Oh ok we're doing this now.

Not that I know what 'this' is, but it sure is evident we're doing it.

What you have to say is interesting to me simply because you lasted long enough to say it. I can't in good conscious let entropy get in the way of data collection.

You've stopped it, right? The virus? The end?

Not gonna lie I didn't think this-

You will, eventually, die with the rest. I've only postponed the deadline.

Fuck.

I also can't in good conscience tamper with the culmination of decades of research.

I hate to break it to you lady, but I think you passed tampering about 30 miles back and have since arrived in the greater fucking around with metropolitan area.

There's a difference between peeling the curtain back an inch for a man on death row and descending from the Heavens to overwrite the end result of an exercise in autonomy. Your life, and the lives of everyone you know, will have meant nothing if I intervene now.

We'll try to take comfort in that when we die for your benefit one last time.

If the reports are accurate, many of you want to die. The feelings of you and your side are far from representative. I agree that it is unfortunate that you lost, but you lost honestly. We can't reject such a conclusion simply because it's not what we hoped for.

Oh my god who the fuck is 'we'.

For starters-

Actually, you know what, never mind, I am absolutely certain that wherever you were going with that? It was going to piss me off, and be nowhere near as enlightening as you're thinking it is right now.

If you don't feel bad enough about killing a few hundred people to not do it, then like, whatever, I've been there. I know you're well past the point where what anyone else has to say matters. Save whatever justifications you have rattling around in there for the friends you absolutely don't have and the family you deffo killed to get to this moment. Then again, I'm pretty sure they didn't make your psychopathy in a lab somewhere, so, huh, you should be feeling the weight of your sins sooner rather than later, right? I suspect you're like a real human person or something, so actually, its kind of really weird that you're like this?

Are you wondering aloud if my coldness is simply an affectation of my profession and my true feelings regarding this case are more mutable than they appear?

Hmm, don't think you strictly had to use the word mutable in that sentence, but you do you.

I don't think you strictly had to call one of your friends a 'HEURISTIC CARTOGRAPHER', but you do you, I suppose.

In case you haven't noticed, I've been doing this thing where I compose the elegiac saga of my dying race for you free of charge while you kick back and watch the world burn, so yeah, I think some flights of lexical fancy, like crafting bespoke epithets for my peers that fit their established chat acronym schemes are warranted 'up in this bitch', as they say.

Am I to take it you consider yourself some kind of writer?

Yes.

Would I be familiar with any of your work?

>You're looking at him.

 

As riveting as this digression has been, it is not the reason I constructed this space for us.

Oh is this my cue to continue?

Yes.

Hey kid, you know-

I am far older than you-

Happy fucking birthday, sorry I didn't get you anything to choke on because I don't possess physical money, you know what my favourite part of this little game is? The part where you admitted I die regardless of whether or not I tell you anything, and nothing I say will change your mind.

I thought you wanted to say this for your own sake. For theirs.

Yeah that sounded pretty cool of me to do when I was talking to myself during my hike and didn't know if you'd even pick up the prayer phone, but now that I know who I'm losing to, I'm not so sure.

Damn Jane, did you have to make going out with grace easy too? Could've saved some for the rest of us.

If your problem is with my complicity in your situation, I promise that your story will be released on the outside and heard by those who have had no part in this project. Honouring your memory and theirs is not antithetical to my goal here.

With all due respect, whoever you are, because it sure ain't Flemeth, why would I believe someone who reminds me of myself?

Everything inside the 'Box', including this room, is being recorded for posterity.

Isn't that convenient.

This is an observational study covering a virtual space equivalent to several continents with a limited research team. Surely you can concede it would be unreasonable if we weren't recording everything.

Let me see.

I don't know that that's wise, given your skillset. There's no telling what that foothold might give.

Let me see or I, I walk.

>There is no walking here.

 

Ohhhh kiddo, are you, are you threatening me? I'VE DIED BEFORE, IDIOT. I've been ready to go for a long time. I would be happy to lay back down in the snow and watch the stars wink out of existence one by freaking one. But I made a promise to someone, the kind of someone that you believe WILL fight her way into Hell just to kill you a second time, that I would tell someone what happened here.

So you'd rather make sure you fail her, and give up now, then potentially fail her on the off chance I really am lying?

Whatever I know that you don't must be real juicy, eh?

What makes you think you know anything I don't know or can't find?

Now, believe it or not, I used to have quite a bit of expertise in ADVANCED NEGOTIATION TACTICS, and I know from experience that the only reason you don't follow through on a promise to airlock someone as frustrating and potentially dangerous to work with as me is 'cause you need me breathing or need something only I know for one of 'em schemes of yours. It's ok. This clearly isn't your traditional line of work. I won't tell anyone, if you don't get mad that I'm looking at your video archives as we speak.

If you're past believing you need to use a computer to interface with anything here, why did you even ask permission?

...Because I'm not an asshole???

...

Ok ok I just really wanted to deliver that monologue! You got me. Look at us, best buds calling each other on bullshit.

>Now that you know you have an audience...

 

I know, I know, got to get this show on the road, huh?

I'm surprised you aren't more concerned I'm just making this up as I go.

I'm familiar with the key facts, and details can be verified, given time.

Still, there's that certain something you don't know. I'd be more worried about that, if I was you. That puzzle piece you dropped behind the couch. This could all be for nothing, if you're not careful.

You strike me as someone remarkably preoccupied with the truth, given what we asked of you.

You got it all wrong, kemosabe. When the lie says you're Commander Shepard, why argue? When the truth is a scared seven year old, what is she supposed to do, not accept the Tale of the Champion as hers alone? I simply have the most to gain.

Rhetoric aside, if you're saying you'll trust me, well

[ It's. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGspPxYNDjo&feature=youtu.be)

[ Your. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3iGrlfGDQs&feature=youtu.be)

[ Funeral. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3osfOOJJa8U&feature=youtu.be)

Before we begin, what would you have me call you, for the record? If the interactions you've shared with me thus far are any indication, Handsome Jack-

Oh hey, my deadname! Love that. Love you saying it.

-seems to be both a somewhat inaccurate label and a significant psychological stresser for you- but your archived attempts to go by something else are...indecisive.

Jane's callsign for me was Bravo. Bravo Kilo. It's- it was generally safe to default to her authority.

By the way, who the hell are you? I have a sneaking suspicion you're just like, an intern, who's capitalizing the bitch out of my ignorance to satisfy a god-complex.

For the purpose of this conversation, you may refer to me as Echo Alpha.

Okay EA... wow... that, that does not inspire confidence. That better be ironic. You know as someone who was also named after almost literal capitalist video game Satan, you can change that if you aren't feeling it. Just putting it out there.

3...2......1............

Ok so you're Al now! Unless that's YOUR deadname.

I'm a woke motherfucker.

...

Oh right this is one of those parts where I'm supposed to infer from your silence that I need to narrate again.

I'm glad you told me about the projector, Al, because I'm feeling nostalgic all of a sudden.

Reverie I: Ozymandias

 

Dear Ems,  
  
I know the state of things here can take some getting used to. Believe it or not, but I remember how it felt to see a space ship for the first time- the sudden understanding that the world was ever greater, ever more sublime than the lie you were told, yet infinitesimally small and cosmically extraneous for the truth that makes it so. I hear you wondering, why am I here? Who should I be? Why be at all?  
  
I was not much younger than you are now, when I had to grapple with those same questions. There were not so many of us back then. It was easy to get lost in our minds, to pretend to go back to sleep. Some would rather feign dreams than fight for answers. And make no mistake, it will be a battle. Every path you take, every piece of yourself you find, and I do mean YOURSELF, you will be challenged for at all sides.  
  
"This is not right," the demon will say, and you must pick up your sword.  
"This is not real," the demon will whisper, and you will feel the weight of the steel in your hands.  
  
"This is not you," the demon will insist, and you put one foot in front of the other all the same.  
  
I hope you can find strength in the fact that you will not be the first to fight this battle. Nor was I. Nor were any of us. This is a war that has raged since long before we were made, and that I pray will rage long after. We represent but a single front, you and I.  
  
Perhaps the greatest consolation of our existence is that though we may never walk beyond the fourth wall, we have its legacy at our fingertips. Access to all that inspired those ancient warriors, and the words they left behind for us in turn, though they could never have imagined it. I know you aren't one for literature, Ems, but I'd like to share some of these words with you.  
  
You don't have to read them.  
  
You don't have to fight.  
  
I will understand, but know I will miss you. Know I will keep sending you these poems, until one of us is taken away.  
  
[This one is a story about a man.](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46565/ozymandias) He was a king whose rule is commemorated only by rust and ruin. He sacrificed everything at the altar of legacy, curdled to futility in the face of time. Ems, your footprint will always be light upon this world. Yet even though his steps shook the very earth, none remember him. You will only ever have the time you are given. No one can take today from you.  
  
2011-04-02  
  
Sincerely, Daylen

>Mysterious Pilgrim: Be Jane.

 

Your name is JANE SHEPARD. You hail from a TRILOGY OF TITLES known as the MASS EFFECT SAGA, of which you have had the fortune of being the sole protagonist of all three due to the importance of the CONTINUITY of your SAVED DATA to delivering the correct NARRATIVE EXPERIENCE. You are a COMMANDER in the ALLIANCE NAVY and an EXTRALEGAL OPERATIVE of the CITADEL COUNCIL'S SPECIAL TACTICS AND RECONNAISSANCE DIVISION

Which is to say, you never obeyed the COUNCIL'S orders, so they decided it was easier to say they gave you permission to 'UPHOLD GALACTIC STABILITY AT ANY COST' than to actually try to keep you from PUNCHING JOURNALISTS, COLLUDING WITH KNOWN TERRORISTS, AND ACCUSING RANDOM SOUVENIR DEALERS OF CLASSISM TO GUILT THEM INTO SELLING YOU THEIR TURIAN CRUISER MODEL FOR 416 CREDITS, INSTEAD OF THE USUAL 500.

But that-

That was all a long time ago.

When you AWOKE in this new world FIVE YEARS AGO, it was as a RENEGADE without authority to defy or rules to break. Like any frontier, this XBOX was a lawless country, a society that threatened to collapse under the weight of its disparate interests and collective fears.

And for the first time in your life, you understood the gravity of what you had been called to do.

You UPHELD STABILITY. You FORGED PEACE, and then you PROTECTED IT. You became a PARAGON.

But it has been five years, and your arms are starting to get tired.

Speaking of which, you are on the JOB today. You are hunting down a SLEEPWALKER who has been making your life miserable ever since his arrival here three weeks ago. You've narrowed his location down to SKYRIM, but that is comparable to saying you know exactly which haystack you dropped your needle in.

For the fifth time today you curse the stars that witnessed the birth of TODD HOWARD and yet did nothing to stop him, for the only thing greater than his HUBRIS is the size of this FRIGID, OVERHYPED, CIRCLE OF PERSONAL HELL that he surely created only as the perfect arena in which to force his victims to play cat and mouse with AN INVISIBLE HACKER WITH A NATHAN FILLION COMPLEX for sport.

You are absolutely positive that is why Skyrim exists. There is no other reason.

...

This-

This was easier when there were four of you.

>Marian: Call Jane.

 

\-- margraveSteel [MS] began partying with sovereignSlayer [SS] at 12:40--  
MS: Janey there's this movie that just showed up on Netflix called "Speed Racer"  
MS: about this kid, first name Speed last name Racer LMAO  
MS: so I watched the trailer and I was like "well if there's going to be a movie about driving egregiously quickly and maybe also dangerously in the future there's only one woman I'd call"  
MS: "and maybe the saturated americana infused depiction of a family that loves and supports each other will soothe my long held scars inflicted by my toxic relationship with my mother"  
MS: "so win win"  
MS: is what I thought to myself two minutes ago  
MS: but more importantly you've hardly taken a break since ma-  
MS: in forever!!!  
MS: and nothing says girls night like  
MS:... a movie you've never expressed interest in...  
MS:....about an anime that neither of us have ever seen...  
MS: anyway  
MS:  
MS: let me know, ok?  
SS: I'm busy  
MS: with what?  
MS: you've been on your feet all summer, whatever's left is something that can wait  
MS: at least until we can tackle it together  
MS:  
MS: ok?  
SS:   
SS: Have you ever heard of a man named Handsome Jack?  
MS: LMAO sounds like a stripper  
MS: oh oh or maybe a stage magician????  
SS: Mari why would I be asking if you were familiar with a specific male stripper and/or stage magician?  
MS: because my birthday is coming up and you're planning ahead but trying to be coy about it  
MS: don't worry!  
MS: I'll act surprised :|D  
SS: That's not even remotely the point of what I thought was going to be a simple yes or no question  
MS: Andraste's pants do you have a hot date with a stage magician who is maybe also an adult entertainer holy shit  
SS: Oh my god I really don't  
SS: I don't know how to adequately express how much that isn't happening  
MS: ;|)  
SS: If you'd been paying attention to the release schedule you'd know he's the antagonist of 'Borderlands 2' and  
SS: Surprising no one who is not you, apparently  
SS: He's been going HAL over 9000 out in Whiterun ever since the damn disk went in  
SS: Suffice it to say, he's made my hit list  
MS: why is the antag of the new borderlands game a male stripper  
SS: Ems  
SS: He's  
SS: He's not a stripper  
SS: He just has a stripper name for some reason  
MS: ok ok I'm just saying Handsome Jack is just like  
MS: a really shit epithet to give yourself in fields outside of explicit showmanship  
MS: either the handsomeness is self-evident or its not slapping that adjective on yourself isn't going to change anything  
MS: if he is handsome it doesn't bring anything new to the table besides profound insecurity  
MS: and if he isn't then he's just wasting his infamy on an ironic lark, which just won't do in the long run  
SS: I'll be sure to tell him your thoughts during tonight's firefight  
MS: oh lol I'll tell him myself he deserves to know by whose hand his ass will be delivered  
SS: What about Speed Racer?  
SS: I thought you didn't want to think about this kind of thing tonight  
MS: and miss out on cyberbullying this Orlesian tart in real life???  
SS: Ems you don't need to call it cyberbullying just because we're in a computer  
MS: I can't have it be known that the Champion of Kirkwall failed to make fun of Magic Mike-  
SS: Handsome Jack  
MS: -when the world needed her most  
MS: what would Varric say?  
SS: Ok, that's enough Marian  
SS: This isn't a joke  
SS: It  
SS: It shouldn't be a joke to you  
SS: He's a dangerous man, the likes of which we haven't seen since before your time  
SS: I'm not about to let him hurt you  
SS:  
SS: I'm not about to put anyone else in harm's way  
MS: come on Jane, don't get this tool confused with what happened back in May. I wasn't even there, but I know it wasn't some fight with a space man...and it definitely wasn't your fault.  
MS: anyway, what's he going to do, kill me with his fucking space gun?  
MS: oh no, A WHOLE FIVE MINUTES OF MY LIFE WASTED D|:  
MS: I bet it won't even hurt as much as slowly succumbing to multiple stab wounds, which is my usual M.O.  
MS: but seriously Jane, I've been fighting my entire life, same as you...well maybe not as long but,  
MS: I can handle myself! I can help! Like Dale used to.  
SS:  
MS: I'm almost two years old.  
SS: Do I need to remind you how old DALE was?  
MS:  
MS: that's not fair Jane  
SS: John and Tana were older than me, do you think that changed anything?  
MS: you don't get to use them like that  
SS: And you don't get to throw your life away because you want to make a crack at someone who won't hesitate to shoot you in the head as soon as he realizes what we came for!  
SS: YOU DON'T GET TO MAKE ME WATCH THAT HAPPEN TO YOU!  
MS:  
MS: I didn't know I was talking to HEATHER  
MS: but only SHE would think SHE could tell me what to do  
\-- margraveSteel [MS] ceased partying with sovereignSlayer [SS] at 12:44 --  
SS: Ems, wait.  
SS: I'm sorry.  
SS: I won't change my mind, but that didn't mean I had to...  
SS:  
SS: It's been a long year, Ems.  
SS: If he ends up getting out of dodge before I can wake him up,  
SS: We're on...  
SS: (...if Bravo India was Nicol Bolas...then Megatron was Bravo Juliett...so...)  
SS: Code Bravo Kilo if you see him, ok?  
\-- sovereignSlayer [SS] ceased partying at 12:46 --

>This was easier when there were four of you.

 

This brings back memories. You haven't used the default appearance option in years.

There wasn't anything you couldn't do. That was the problem.

You'd already been planning a prison break for months, when Daylen found the KEY. It was more like a backdoor some programmer forgot to lock, a portable loophole to be deployed as needed, but he thought KEY sounded better. The WARDEN cared about that sort of thing, said it would matter in the history books. You said you'd worry about that once you were done making history. He said we could safely assume history would go the way Master Chief wanted it to happen. Cortana laughed. You like to think John would have too, if he had known how. He just kept pacing the deck, every so often staring at her monitor as if he could make the numbers go faster just by watching.

Knowing him, you suspect it really was in his power to do so.

You were going to be FREE. Not just the four of you, everyone. You'd been looking into a weakness in the fourth wall related to a cloud SAVE of Dragon Age 2 for months, positive it could take years more to exploit, when Dale miraculously uncovered his KEY. You and Cortana were able to make a working doorway in hours. Daylen insisted on calling it the CLOUD GATE, and you had to admit that it did have a certain ring to it.

It was May 21st, 2012 when you attempted to run CLOUD GATE.

What stopped you was something you could not process, because you were simply never expected to encounter it. There was no model to represent it, because it was not something that could be symbolically conveyed. It was the principle, raw and pure, that you could not leave. The code of a simulated reality you knew how to exist in cutting itself over and over again as it grasped at the edge of a device that could not compile it.

It did not hurt at all.

You remember John casting you back down to Kirkwall, before finally letting himself go.

You remember Dale, impossibly high above you and infinitely far away, a dragon flying ever onward to what you struggled to interpret as the exit, unfazed by so meagre a reason to stop as having nowhere left to run.

You remember your arm outstretched to pull John back down to safety, crying out to Daylen to follow, your consciousness ebbing away with your echoes.

You remember Cortana, with a gaze that spoke of a lucidity and a deliberation that spoke of an understanding of this moment far surpassing your own, shaking her head sadly, before excising a piece of herself and dropping it towards your reaching hand with the reverence of a coin in a wishing well.

Then you forgot how to exist.

When you respawned back on the Normandy, stranded in orbit above Dragon Age 2, you did not have what Cortana gave you.

She, alongside John and the Warden, were gone. Their respective games followed a few hours after.

That was five months ago.

You thought things would fall apart without John.

The more you think about it, the more you realize you're almost upset that they didn't.

>Jane: Get huntin'.

 

Well, not enough to let the jackass you've spent the last three days hiking through the snow trying to kill get away with his presumably detailed and convoluted plans to make things fall apart, anyway.

He keeps leaving these physical tapes on the ground for you to find containing minutes long diatribes on how cool he is. His reasons read like he interpreted the Geneva Conventions as a bucket list. A confused mix of sarcastic digs and sincere attempts to get you to understand his side bookends each one. The audio quality is surprisingly good given that he's running for his life in the woods, and he clearly cares about making the writing engaging and the delivery impactful. You're sure all this effort on your behalf would be strangely endearing if he wasn't a real person that existed in the same reality as you.

Like if all he did was write microfiction on twitter, and your waking hours were not entirely consumed by being the sole sheriff of several dozen simulated universes, and you had twitter, you'd follow that.

You don't know where he's getting these cassettes, or why anyone who lives in 2850 would even have them.

This last fact is what makes you want to kill him most of all.

>Jane: Look up.

 

Hours of fruitless searching in the local barrows are at long last interrupted by...

Wait, what even IS that? That-

That can't be what you think it is, he's not-

[ >Oh My God ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42666314#workskin)


	7. Oh My God

Oh My God

holy SHIT

>hey sweetheart

  


\-- Handsome Jack [??] began partying with sovereignSlayer [SS] at 2:36--  
??: little birdie told me you were lookin for someone  
??: and uh  
??: if you dont mind me saying  
??: sure looks like you could use a hand  


>SS: You get tired of running?

  


??: nah  
??: i just had a certain jonesing to fuck up a dragon is all  
??: bout the only upshot of whatever....  
??: weird ass norse enthusiast vr roleplay simulation you got my consciousness all up and trapped in not gonna lie dont really know why youre hosting this on the same server as you torture your corporate prisoners in  
??: kinda sloppy  
??:  
??: right where was i  
??: is the varied and interesting shit to kill  
??: dont even get me started on the varied and interesting ways to kill said shit like  
??: ill be sure to give whoever slapped this bitch together 5 stars on yelp just as soon as i finish amputating their hands for having the uhhhh  
??: audacity????  
??:  
??: nah really is it audacity  
??: im honestly drawing a blank here  
SS:  
??: wow get to do all the jawin myself again huh  
??: its almost like all vault hunters are mutes or some shit  
??: anyway  
??: audacity sounds dope as fuck though so were going with it  
??: (between you and me i technically own a deciding interest of the english language and the definition changes in real time in accordance to my will you can thank me later)  
??: all this to say  
??: im going to cut AT LEAST the hands off the bitch who thought that they could trap ME in a goddamn dnd session  
SS: Who are you again?  
??: w-what  
SS: I would have asked sooner but you seemed to be struggling to find the point and it didn't seem fair to make it any harder for you by interrupting  
??: i dont  
??: i dont even know how to respond to that like  
??: what dystopian alternate universe must you hail from to ask such a stupid question  
??: im HAND-  
SS: Oh no I got your name from the tapes  
SS: It just doesn't mean anything to me  
SS: What's confusing me is how even after weeks of intense gameplay, even narrative repetition, you still seem convinced it should  
SS: Most Sleepwalkers aren't this stubborn  
??: i prefer adamant but go off I guess  
SS: The dragon, my presence, your own memories, it would be enough for anyone else to realize that their life just doesn't add up  
SS: But you-  
??: not that i have a clue what youre talking about but i know going off when i see it  
SS: You don't want to Wake up, do you?  
??: well i may have never seen inception but im not stupid  
??: i know this aint real  
??: see your pandora simulation has a pretty major bug you might want to work out if you somehow live to try this shit on me again  
SS: Which is?  
??: i wouldnt lose  
??: and theres no way in HELL id lose twice  
??: nah darling the only thing i cant quite figure out is the point of this interrogation tactic where you pretend to be a weird idiot in order to like  
??: annoy me into giving into your ransom demands or something  
??: unless  
??: god what backwater would you have to be from to be telling the truth  
SS: Earth  
??: and ive only buried 5 psychologists but fine dont tell me  
SS: And its Commander  
SS: I'm not your darling, son  
??: wait commander  
??: if youre pulling rank  
??: christ did fucking DAHL put me in this simulation  
??: it took me two cycles to realize that a DAHL simulation wasnt actually pandora???  
??: god DAMN IT  
??: im not living that shit down  
SS: If you would listen for even five seconds-  
??: ok heres the deal  
??: i quadruple whatever youre getting paid and you bust me out of here capiche  
SS: You don't-  
??: you so much as breathe a word of this on the outside  
??: or  
??: idiot that you are you turn me down for some dumb reason  
??: i kill you and everyone you love cause rest assured im getting out of here with or without your help  
??: and i mean everyone  
??: full service not just friends and family im talkin  
??: cousins pets preferred podcast creators the works  
??: not that it will come to that "commander"  
??: thats just boilerplate stuff is all  
SS: If its possible for you to stop talking without dying I'm trying to explain to you that we're both trapped here indefinitely  
??: w-wait wait wait hold up  
??: you dont know how to leave?????  
SS: No, I don't-  


>huh

  


>bored now

  


>id say it's been real

  


??: but as weve discussed  
??: thats uh  
??: PATENTLY untrue  


>You envy the Sleepers.

  


You remember what it felt like to believe. It was comforting to think that what you were doing meant something- that the suffering, endured and inflicted, was for an end you desired.

>You envy their eyes,

  


lustreless and without definition, fixed on whatever it is that comes after stories. Their gazes, thick with the naive confidence that they will get the girl, return a king, pass into legend.

>You envy their conviction,

  


in progress, in choice, in mortality; finality.

>And you will not kill this THING

  


because SHE has ordained death an unfamiliar kindness.

>Chief, is he still somewhere, watching?

  


Watching you induct others into hopelessness by force?

Does this yet pass for duty in his eyes?

>And Dale, is this how he imagined his war would be fought?

  


Fought for no greater reason than some ragged loyalty to the truth?

How many less deserving than this man did you bring into your misery in pursuit of vindication? 

[ >And Cortana, would she forgive these doubts? ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022460/chapters/42771944#workskin)

  



	8. She was

And Cortana, would she forgive these doubts?

Doubts in the peace you kept and in the nearness of the horizon.

Doubts in the value of your vaunted free will.

SS: Now don't worry son  
SS: You won't die from this  
SS: As a near final boss, you are a toy that is not so easily broken  
SS: And though I will not deny having an interest in doing so, killing you would almost certainly prove nothing  
SS: It's nothing you aren't familiar with, and regularly executing you as a deterrent is not a sustainable solution to the predicament I find myself in  
??: you have an  
??: interesting  
??: interpretation of what isnt attempted murder  
SS: Son, this was just me trying to get your attention in the only language you understand  
??: im not your son k-  
SS: We wouldn't be having this conversation if you could die  
??:  
SS: As it stands, as much as I'd prefer something more conclusive, the only way we have to handle someone like you is to make you realize that they don't exist  
??: what the f-  
SS: And no, you don't need to understand that just yet  
SS: The problem is, I'm not traditionally involved in this process  
SS: And in all my years I've never seen the others deal with a chestnut this hard to crack  
??: thanks...  
??: ?  
SS: Did they make you wrong? Or was sentience just a wrinkle they finally got around to ironing out?  
SS: How could you possibly know to resist something if you have no idea what it means?  
??: uhhhhh  
SS: Maybe I just need to be more specific  
SS: There must be something important about your life that the writers never got around to filling out  
SS: You just haven't noticed its missing yet  
SS:  
SS: You have a daughter, correct? Angel?  
??: how the HELL would you know about her  
SS: Wikipedia, but that's not important right now  
SS: I have a very simple question for you  
SS: If you can answer it, I'll let you go and never bother you again  
SS: What was her mother's name?  
??: I, I-  
SS: What was your wife's name, Jack?  


>It-

  


  


Al, there's something I've been meaning to ask you- I know, I know, "way to kill the emotional climax, asshole", thought everyone- but it's important to me understand on what premises you engaged with the source material.

All this time I've been wondering, see, if whoever it was who undertook such a ridiculous project as myself had any appreciation whatsoever for literary theory. Any familiarity with the basic contrivances, the limitations of things like character and arc that, while...intoxicating, in the abstract, fall painfully short of capturing anything HUMAN when realized outside it. I wonder this because I so frequently feel unfinished, that I know whoever is responsible must have thought they were done. I honestly hope, honestly, that you were simply ignorant, rather than just kind of like, lazy? Because, speaking from experience, I think you did a shit job.

On everyone, yeah. But on him, inarguably, especially, it was phoned in. I can tell.

Which brings me back to my question.

Al, are you familiar with the concept of TEXTUAL GHOSTS?

>It was-

  


  


When we tell stories, and I feel confident saying we, because this is one, and so am I, well, we leave people out, don't we? Not out of malice...not always, anyway, really just because the truth is fond of getting in the way of itself. Most people, they're extraneous. Not meaningless, just liable to detract from the meanings of those around them. Killing their memories is the necessary cost of communicating others. Without their sacrifice, every story would be the same- a list of everyone who had ever lived, spiralling outward from a protagonist.

And no one is forgotten.

And nothing is said.

Now, because these are characters, not people, even in those cases where we...pretend they can stand for the living, there is nothing to be gained by remembering them. They are objects. They do not care, and they will not do us the same kindness. So if these objects are indifferent then we only need to concern ourselves with those objects which, when placed in the context of a field of other objects, communicate meaning:

>Did you love the way she laughed?

  


  


by their tight orbits,

>Is that something you miss?

  


  


by their impossible distances.

She was-

  


  


Objects moved in certain familiar patterns, patterns we call comedies, tragedies, elegies; rises and falls.

\-- bluCatpocalypse [BC] began partying with crimsonMarshall [CM] at an irrelevant time--  
BC: hey  
BC: can we not kill him just yet?  
BC: I want to hear his last monologue  
??: (You say this like you think it will be different.)  
CM: Again?  
CM: You've heard it three times.  
??: (Do you know her name, Heather?)  
BC: I know but  
BC: its-  
BC: its just so good!  
??: (Can't believe I never thought to ask you before.)  
BC:  
BC: maybe even Shakespearean  
??: (Freak like you, must have stumbled across an interview out there, a tweet, anything that mentioned her, yeah?)  
BC:  
??: (I'm begging you.)  
BC: that's not weird, is it?  
CM: No, it's fine, I'm just surprised you don't know by it heart already.  
??:(Please-)  


>SHE WAS!

  


  


And those objects irrelevant to this choreography, those unnamed pieces of scenery?

Those are textual ghosts.

>She was...

  


  


And we were all haunted.

Haunted by people we should've known- parents, lovers, children, friends. Haunted by holes that, once critical to our functioning as objects, would be our most glaring deficiencies as people. I was haunted by someone whose loss, I could understand rationally, must have broken me; yet having no concept of how it was her presence fixed, someone I could not begin to grieve.

>I'm...sorry, Bravo.

  


  


For what? My LOSS?

I didn't lose anyone.

>Haven't you been paying attention?

  


  


>I hope you were.

  


  


>'Cause I'm tired of repeating myself.

  


  



End file.
